This story originally aired on April 12, 2025. It was updated on June 27, 2026.It's been decades since Reginald Reed Jr., known as Reggie, last saw his mother Selonia Reed.Reggie Reed: After my mother was murdered, things moved fast … I couldn't really understand, like, why would somebody kill her? Like, what did she do?Reggie Reed: I feel like I missed out on a huge part of life that I'll never get back. Reggie was only 6 years old on Aug. 22, 1987. One of the last things he remembers is his mother buying him a chocolate chip cookie at the Hammond Square Mall in Louisiana. He told police his mother kissed him when she left the house later that night but the rest, he says, is a blur. Vladimir Duthiers | "48 Hours" contributor: When you think about that … what does that feel like? Reggie Reed: When I think about … how my mother's life was shortened and how my experience was shortened, I feel empty …
Vladimir Duthiers: If somebody says to you who was … Selonia, what do you say? Reggie Reed: If someone asks me who is Selonia, I would say you're looking at her. (Emotional, takes off his glasses.) Because, based on the description, the memories and what things people have shared, when I look in the mirror, I see my mother. Reggie's memories are at the heart of the memoir he's written about his mother's murder, "The Day My Mother Never Came Home."Reggie Reed (reading from book): Within these pages, you will find the memories of a 6-year-old boy whose mother was murdered … A 15-year-old young man searching for his place in the world without the guidance and encouragement of his mother …Reggie Reed: … the night my mother went out and never came home, life for me and my father basically flipped upside down.
